I think a really interesting question is whether Brian Bedford actually purgered himself when testifying in front of Congress very recently.

He testified that the highest qualified pilots were the lower time pilots because they could get them before they developed bad habits. He further said he has turned away a substantial amount of higher time candidates because they were not as qualified or developed bad habits.

But in retrospect, if that was true, why would Republic have posted hiring minimums much higher in past years on his watch?

Time period 47:55 through 48:40
and again at 53:40 through 56:00

Air Service to Small and Rural Communities | Airline Pilot Info

The guy's obviously someone who is poisonous to the well-being of his employees, but what he said sure doesn't rise to the level of perjury. What he expressed are merely opinions.

More like falsehoods being thrown out in an attempt to get the hiring minimum flight times lowered, instead of actually raising the pay for professional pilots to attract those that meet the existing minimums!

God told him to do it.

The big ones off the top of my head that were PFT.
Comair
Express Jet(cont exp)
ASA
Chatauqua
ACA - not sure

Wait. Really? Got my private ticket in '89 and have never even heard of this...

Good point..when I was hired in early 2011, an ATP was a minimum requirement.


....and if it wasn't perjury, it was certainly misleading.

BIZEX
JSI, now PSA
ExpressOne, later Pinnacle
ACA did till fall of 1999, IIRC. They later went to a training contract, as did some others.

Late 90's, AWAC and AE had the same published mins, 2500TT, 1000ME, preferably 500 turbine with 121 or 135 experience.

PFT back then was more the norm, NOT the exception.

I don't remember, AE, AWAC, Great Lakes, TSA, Piedmont, or Allageny (SP) charging. But the last 2 had pretty high mins as well. I don't remember MESA or any of the subsidiaries having it. Maybe the companies that made up Eagle BEFORE there was AE did. Simmons, WingsWest, Nashville Eagle, etc.

I can't remember if Mesaba or UFS, or CCAir had it or not.

Reference the above. In the early 90's, getting hired at the "commuters" to fly a turboprop was roughly $5k IIRC. COEX had a sliding scale depending on how much time one had and which aircraft one was hired into.

By the time the RJ's came online at the end of the PFT era, getting hired into a jet was right around $10k.

Also, back then many of them did conditional hiring. You interviewed at the airline, and were hired as long as you passed the flight training portion FIRST. Often times, MOST of the training (systems and sim) was done by an outsourced vendor, often FSI. After that was done, THEN you'd be sent to the airline's basic indoc course.

I REALLY wish in would have kept some of those AirInc books from "back in the day".

Pulling all this info from my Rainman memory is fatiguing.

Don't worry too much about it...he's looking for a EASA-style frozen ATP or MPL, which is very expensive training.

Bedford is chasing a fantasy...someday he'll realize that the system that he envisions still requires a $100k-$150K outlay by a prospective new-hire. There's no changing the fact that it will still require a much better and more immediate return on investment.

His fantasy of creating a pipeline of cheap, low-hour pilots is unrealistic.

Late 90's till 2001, average life expectancy of a regional pilot that upgraded and got the "magical 1000TPIC" varied from 2-4 years, depending what company, and what equipment. Many back then operated both props and jets, with a jet FO usually having a seat lock.

It could really depend on where one worked back then. Some "commuters" paid $8-10-12/hr, AFTER paying $5k for training, with NO workrules, all for the privilege to grunt out 6-8-10 legs a day in a Metro/1900/J32, etc. AWAC paid their prop FO's upwards of $20/hr BACK THEN.